Quiet Takes Work
On the gap between the life we want and the easy path
Hey everybody — I missed last week. Life has been coming at me fast, and Thanksgiving felt like a reasonable one to let go. In the last couple of weeks I’ve bought a new house, packed, moved, tried to get set up, eaten turkey, gotten sick, gotten well, entertained my kids, hunted for a Christmas tree, written, remodeled, and shopped. The list refills faster than I can empty it.
The new place isn’t quite off-grid, but it’s close enough to feel like it. Electricity, yes. Everything else, no. My mailbox is ten minutes down the road, and nobody delivers packages. UPS and FedEx stop miles away. DoorDash and Uber don’t exist out here. I haul my own trash.
But the tradeoff is everything I hoped. On the porch, the only sound is the birds and the wind in the trees. I can see the stars from my bed. I wake up, go downstairs, light the wood stove, make a cup of tea, and actually begin the day on purpose. Then, when I’m ready, I drive the slow 10 miles in to town and enter the world on my terms. It’s all my favorite parts of camping but with running water and a comfortable couch and—yes—a big-screen TV. (We call that foreshadowing.)
In the middle of the chaos of moving, though, my behavior didn’t exactly match the serene vision of this place. I bought myself some time by giving the boys more screen time than usual. I remembered how much fun I had playing Tony Hawk as a kid, downloaded it, and set them up so I could unpack boxes and try to get ahead of the mess.
They loved it. Especially my five-year-old.
And last night at dinner, it all came to a head.
“What do you mean I don’t get to play skateboarding any more today?”
“Well, by the time we get home it’ll be time to get ready for bed.”
Meltdown. A full-body, full-volume, all-systems-go collapse. It looked physically painful for him to imagine not playing. And honestly, I recognized that feeling. It doesn’t take long for our brains to hook into something that gives us a hit of relief in the middle of overwhelm.
Standing there with him, I could feel the gap between the life I’m trying to build out here—slow mornings, intention, breathing room—and the life I default into when I’m overloaded. A glowing rectangle can bridge that gap for a minute, but the bill comes due fast. In a few days, he’d built a habit. In a few days, I had too.
I moved out here for quiet and space. But those things aren’t guaranteed by a location. They’re built choice by choice, even on the chaotic days. Especially on the chaotic days.
I don’t have all the answers. Most days I barely have the questions in the right order. But I’m trying to match the life I say I want with the life I’m actually living. To practice intention instead of just admiring it from afar. To give my kids the kind of internal strength I’m still trying to find for myself.
Maybe I’ll have it all figured out by next Tuesday. But honestly? I think the figuring-it-out part might be the whole point.